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Indie-rock veterans release two albums on same day, each unique but equally solid.

Like Guns N’ Roses, Tom Waits and Bruce Springsteen before them, Montreal-cum-Los Angeles indie band Islands are releasing two different studio albums on the same day. Taste is an infectious synth-styled pop affair. Meanwhile a leaner, guitar-leaning approach oozes from Should I Remain Here, At Sea? MySpace caught up with Islands’ Nick Thorburn to talk about the dual releases, Freddie Gray, a parrot and PledgeMusic.

Was the idea to make two albums at the same time something you’d been kicking around for a while?

It came about right when it was about time to make the record last summer. We had the material and I started to realize I was making two different records; two very distinct styles of songs. So it started to become clear during the rehearsal process before we made the record that, yeah, we were making two records.

What was the biggest challenge about tackling the two albums simultaneously?

I guess time. We had three weeks in total so we tracked both records—we did one record first and then the other. We kept them separate because they are separate records. But I guess the timing was just getting everything but we worked really long hours and didn’t take any days off. We just hustled through it.

Did making either album influence how you approached the other record?

Should I Remain Here, At Sea? is the more live record. It’s more guitar-based and natural, so we kind of kept that one pretty unpolished. We tried to get the right mood, capture the right mood of the song. With Taste we did it with synthesizers and drum machines, it was a little more rigid but we played with that and we kept it live too. We still played everything live and then we manipulated some stuff. But it was pretty untouched as well.

How did the song “Fear” come about?

It was around the time we were in the studio and Baltimore was happening, Freddie Gray, the police attacks on black youth. That was just in the news and we had gone to Ferguson a few weeks after Michael Brown was killed and it was in the air. I live in Los Angeles, I’m Canadian but I live in America and it was just something I was thinking about and feeling. I was just trying to express my frustration just as a witness to it.

One tune I’m in love with is “Sun Conure”—what was the inspiration for that song?

Originally it was much more mellow. I mean it is a very gentle song but it didn’t even have that kind of pulse to it. It made it sound like “The Boxer,” something Simon & Garfunkel would’ve done, this rhythmic pulse underneath this very pulled back kind of song that wasn’t very super rhythmic. And I just learned about this bird, that’s the name of a type of parrot. It’s about somebody with a bird that’s annoying.

Do you have a personal favorite off each album?

I really like “At Sea,” the last song off of Should I Remain Here, At Sea? I look at it as the grand finale. I was trying to write like an old sea shanty type of song with that one like a (late British singer-songwriter) Cyril Tawney “Grey Funnel Line.” That was my interpretation of an old mariner’s ballad, a sad song out at sea.

I think on Taste it does change but “Carried Away” we took these acoustic elements like a harmonica and an acoustic guitar and we transformed it into an electronic context. I thought that was a really fun experience and it plays really nicely, it doesn’t feel gimmicky or anything.

Are you partial to one album over the other?

I think Taste is a record I’m very proud of. It’s like my version or Islands version of what a pop song is. It’s dignified, it doesn’t pander in the way that I think a lot of pop music tends to. But I feel we have hooks and it has a pulse to it. I feel proud of that.

Should I Remain Here, At Sea? has songs on it that I’m so proud of lyrically, I think it’s better than most things I’ve ever done. So it’s hard to pick which one is better but each has a real strength.

As of April 18 you reached 236 percent of your fundraising goal on PledgeMusic. Are you surprised by the response?

Yeah it’s been really cool, it’s reaffirming that the thing we’re doing is not in vain. We’re making records and people—even if it’s a select group of people—they’re passionate about it. If it matters to somebody then it matters to me. It felt comforting.

What advice would you have for an artist considering doing two albums at once?

Be prepared for twice the workload—it makes your life twice as difficult. But I also think it’s twice as rewarding. It shouldn’t be a forced thing or too deliberated. It should feel like a natural conclusion, which is what this was. It really felt like there was no real way around it other than making two records.

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